First, the trigger: 'When someone presents new evidence which suggests that you're not who you appear to be or suggest the nature of your hidden agenda...' So, what evidence and how do they present it? if I think that the Agent has a hidden agenda and I investigate it, at what point is the move triggered? When I have suspicions? When I follow them up? When I present my findings to a third party? There seems to be a long chain here before I get to presenting evidence to the suspect.
The trigger should really be on the "
and you choose to protect your secrets with lies." The stuff before that is the pre-requisits, but the decision to protect their secret with lies is the point where the player acts. Hence thats the trigger.
The original version of the of the skill had the first line ""When someone suspects that you're not who you appear to be or that you have a hidden agenda, and questions you, mark experience. If they then accept whatever plausible lie you spin them, they gain leverage on you."
There were a number of issues with this:
1) The player had no agency here. They were gaining XP as the result of things happening around them, as opposed to something they did.
2) The move assumed action by the player - which turned out not to be the case. What if instead of lying they decided to just shoot their accuser, or to destroy the evidence whatever it was.
3) It was potentially open to abuse. A couple of complicit players could gain an XP point per scene by repeatedly challeneging each other. (Monsterhearts Singleton rule applies and limits it to 1 XP per scene)
We added the reference to 'new evidence' to make it clear that the move only triggers if the situation has changed. You blow up a shuttle.. cool. Someone finds footage of you leaving the shuttlebay and question you; you can trigger the move, however further questioning about the video footage wont allow you to trigger the move. Then someone finds your fingerprionts on the remains - thats new evidenece.
How they present it - anythign really. They could just mention it in passing. Maybe I should change that first line to
When someone has fresh evidence. If removes the suggestion that it has to have some form of formal presentation.
Second, your reaction: '...and you choose to protect your secrets with lies..' Why wouldn't I, if I have something to hide? And if I don't, what happens?
I don't really know, but players do all sorts of things. They might assume the game was up and run. They might shoot their accuser. They might try to destroy the evidence.
Having said that I assume anyone who takes this move is flagging that they want to tell lies, build a complicated web of deceit, complicate their own lives, and eventually have their lies come back to bite them - so I assume most of the time anyone with this move will lie. Its important they have the option to do other weird shit though.
Third, their reaction: 'If they then accept whatever plausible story you spin them, they gain leverage on you.' Doesn't this reward them for doing nothing? It encourages them to avoid confrontation and to drop the matter from the story; indeed, the more often they ignore the evidence in front of them and accept the cover story, the more they get rewarded, which seems more like a comedy/farce mechanic than gritty drama.
Theres something of an issue here.
If they dont drop it then the story ends fast. We have a spy / sabateur / assassin who is in deep cover. The game has open secrets so its well known. Some evidence comes to light which throws their existence into question. They are accused. The player questioning is unlikely to drop it no matter how good the cover-up/lies because we have open secrets and he knows his suspicions are right. The spy is uncovered and killed. The end.
If we want to draw that out it actually pays to reward players for not following through to the conclusion on the open secrets. At the same time it does seem farce like if carried too far. I can think of several TV shows where the continued abilty of a protagonist to ignore repeated clues started wearing on the viewer.
My hope is that the Leverage they are building up on the Spy at some point encourages them to break the cycle. When they have enough ammunition there needs to be a scene where they put it all together. They choose not to drop it - and all that leverage represents the clues they can now start attributing to facts.
What about something more like this:
When another PC acts on their suspicions about you, you may present them with the evidence they find and mark experience; if they then immediately lose that evidence, they gain leverage on you.
This pushes the responsibility for giving away their true agenda onto the player, giving them some control over the speed at which their story gets revealed but rewarding them for doing so; the investigator can then either hold onto the evidence or narrate how it gets destroyed/lost but their aroused suspicions give them leverage. I don't know if that's what you're going for though, so it might be the wrong direction.
I like that a
lot. I like the fact it places the pacing in the hands of the Agent, and not the investigator. I do however want to try and keep the building network of lies. Thank you. You've given me lots to think about :) I'll also see what Neil thinks.